Rocks take it to Geneseo, 4-2

Punching through the first four goals of the game was just what Rock Island needed to push past visiting Geneseo Sept. 10 for the 4-2 non-conference victory.

“I think what happened was we played Rock Island with the mentality that we were going to win,” said head coach Ian Kline. “We came out slow and they (Rock Island) didn’t and Rock Island had the momentum.”

The Rocks jumped out to a 2-0 lead in the first half on goals from Gregory Davis, unassisted, and Lay Htoo on the assist from Davis.

Rock Island continued its scoring drive in the second half as the Rocks knocked through two more goals for a 4-0 advantage. Adam Solis added the third goal of the night, unassisted, and Nizam Patsiyev on the assist from Davis scored the fourth.

Geneseo finally got on the board in the second half with two goals from Tyler Fox, both on the assist from Hunter McVietty.

“We had to wake them (our players) up and told them we were beating ourselves,” said Kline. “We need to posses the ball and we actually had ample opportunities to score point blank, but we couldn’t finish and that was unfortunate.”

The Leafs finished the game taking 20 shots on goal, while Rock Island made 10. In the net, Geneseo made four saves and Rock Island, 12.

Geneseo had two home matches scheduled for Monday,?Sept. 15 against Orion and Tuesday, Sept. 16 against Chillicothe IVC, but due to the rain over the weekend those games were postponed. The Orion contest was rescheduled for Sept. 18, please see next week’s Republic for results. The Chillicothe IVC match has not been rescheduled at this time.

“We need to work on finishing the game off and making that final push, we had opportunities to score, but we just couldn’t finish,” said Kline.

The Leafs (1-5-1 overall) will next travel to Rock Island to face the Alleman Pioneers at 5 p.m. Sept. 22.